Data and Approach

We used IRS tax data for the state of Tennessee to review income levels by zip code, along with other financial variables, to find correlation with county level school data. We analyzed school and tax data separately, as well as their influence on each other. The data sources for our research have been included in our Sources Cited.

Cleaning the Data

Some school districts reported a graduation rate of 0%. Obviously, this is not accurate, and were likely empty values. We removed this data as to not influence the averages per CORE Region. We also identified instances where county data did not map exactly between tax and shool data. We were able to leverage the zip code crosswalk to join these datasets, as well as some data cleansing to ensure DeKalb County was properly recognized.

Research

School Funding, Taxes, and Economic Growth, An Analysis of the 50 States, was part of our research.

Dual Enrollment for TN School Districts

Centers of Regional Excellence

Adjusted Gross Income

Economically Disadvantaged

Average ACT Composite Scores

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AGI spread across Tennessee

This is the Adjusted Gross Income across TN

ED for TN

This is ED mapping for TN

ACT for TN

This is the ACT scores for TN

Enrollment Expense per Pupil

Graduation Rates by Region

The boxplot below shows that, while most CORE regions in TN have a graduation rate around 90%, we have some outliers in the Northwest and South Central regions.

The outlier in the Northwest region is Humboldt City, with a graduation rate of 68.5%. This school system stands out in other troubling ways, which will be visited again later.

Impact of Economic Disadvantage

In the plot below, we can see that the higher percentage of a student body that qualify for free or reduced lunches score lower in both Math and Science.

Humboldt City school system had 97.9% of their students qualify for free or reduced lunches. Students in the Humboldt City school system had a 43.8% and 38.4% proficiency rate in Science and Math, respectively. As you might recall, Humboldt City also had one of the lowest graduation rates in TN, at 68.5%.

On the opposite side, Lakeland City reported a 14.7% rate of Economically Disadvantaged students, while scoring 90.9% and 88.2% in Science and Math.

Farm Areas

The relationship between the percentage of farm to the percentage of suspension.

Grades Matter!

Using data from the state achievement scores, we were able to accurately predict the average ACT scores for a county given the proficiency rates of four key subject categories: Algebra I, Chemistry, Math, and ELA. Using DeKalb County as a test county, we trained a prediction model on the other 94 counties in Tennessee and we able to predict DeKalb’s ACT Composite score of 19.1.
lm(formula = ACT_Composite ~ AlgI + Chemistry + Math + ELA, data = school_cross_no_dekalb_no_outliers)

Sources Cited